Alan Caruba's blog is a daily look at events, personalities, and issues from an independent point of view. Copyright, Alan Caruba, 2015. With attribution, posts may be shared. A permission request is welcome. Email acaruba@aol.com.

Thursday, October 2, 2014

Celebrating Yom Kippur and Survival

By Alan
Caruba

If you
want to know the depth of Islamic intolerance and, indeed, hatred of other religions
then all you need do is think back to October 6, 1973 when Egypt and Syria
joined together in a massive coordinated attack on Israel. It was Yom Kippur,
the Day of Atonement, the holiest day of the Jewish year.

Yom
Kippur, this year, occurs on Friday, Oct 3, and one can only hope it does not
become an occasion to attack Jews and their synagogues in the Middle East and
throughout the rest of the world. Anti-Semitism is a global phenomenon,
existing even in nations where Jews are hard to find. Those who track it say
that it is increasing.

There are
an estimated six million-plus Jews in the United States and a comparable number
in Israel. There are approximately 14.8 million worldwide. By any comparison
they represent a very small group, but in the minds of millions they are
stereotyped as running the affairs of mankind. That’s insane, but rationality
is rarely a factor when it comes to hating Jews.

In brief,
the Jewish New Year, Rosh Hashanah, begins ten days in which the faithful are
instructed to put their affairs in order, pay bills, and mend fences with those
whom they have had disagreements or conflict. On Yom Kippur Jews seek God’s
forgiveness and ask to be inscribed in the book of life for another year.

If Yom
Kippur is about one’s personal redemption and survival perhaps the most astonishing aspect of
Judaism is the survival of this monotheistic faith, the bedrock of Christianity
and, to a much smaller extent, Islam. Historically, it is some 3,000 years old.
Theologically, it has survived based on its Torah, otherwise known as the Old
Testament, but the survival is one of generations of Jews who held onto their
ancient faith, their covenant with God, in the face of oppression and death.

It
apparently only takes a generation or two to forget the lessons of the past. In
Germany, the anti-Semitism that fed the Holocaust that occurred during World
War II has returned. As Benjamin Weinthal, a Research Fellow at the Foundation
for Defense of Democracies, put it, “With anti-Semitism on the march, Germany’s
politicians and opinion makers are grappling with what went wrong with the
country’s seven-decade-long struggle to come to terms with its past.” Germany’s
Chancellor, Angela Merkel, has said “It is our national and civic duty to fight
anti-Semitism” but Dieter Graumann, the president of Germany’s Central Council
of Jews, calls it “the worst of times since the Nazi era. On the streets, you
hear things like ‘The Jews should be gassed.’ ‘The Jews should be burned.’”

A
significant contributing factor to the rise of anti-Semitism in Europe has been
the influx of Muslims from Middle Eastern and African nations that now compose
a large part of the population. A Jewish scholar and friend noted that
“Norway’s last 819 Jews are now leaving the country. In a few weeks Norway will
be ‘Judenrein’”, free of all Jews. Elsewhere the incidents of hatred and
violence against Jews have occurred in France, the Netherlands, and Italy.

Muslim
immigration to Great Britain has seen a comparable pattern and Jews have been
emigrating from England as a result. In 1990 there were 340,000 Jews. Today
there are 240,000. Islamic attacks on English citizens have become a factor and
the recent beheading of a British citizen has finally awakened its government
to the need for greater vigilance and action against attacks. The ISIS
spokesman in a beheading video had a distinct British accent.

Even
though there had been anti-Semitism in America, following the revelations of
the Nazi Holocaust in the 1940s it dramatically receded. Wikipedia says: “According
to surveys by the Anti-Defamation League, anti-Semitism is rejected by clear
majorities of Americans, with 64% of them lauding Jews' cultural contributions
to the nation in 2011, but a minority holding hateful views of Jews remain,
with 19% of Americans supporting the anti-Semitic canard that Jews co-control Wall
Street in 2011. As well, Holocaust denial in recent years has been only a
fringe phenomenon with less than ten percent of Americans expressing either
opposition or ignorance to the historical record.”

In an August 18, 1790 letter responding to the good
wishes sent him by the Hebrew congregation at Newport, George Washington said,
“It is now no more that toleration is spoken of as if it were the indulgence of
one class of people that another enjoyed the exercise of their inherent natural
rights, for, happily, the Government of the United States, which gives to
bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance, requires only that they who
live under its protection should demean themselves as good citizens in giving
it on all occasions their effectual support.”

American Jews will likely say a prayer of thanks for an
America that has given them its protection. It is also likely that synagogues
in our major and even smaller cities will have some measure of police
protection on Friday. Like all Americans in the era of the Islamic State, they
will need it.

About Me

I am and have been for a long time a writer by profession. I have several books to my credit and my daily column, "Warning Signs", is disseminated on many Internet news and opinion websites, as well as blogs. In addition, I am a longtime book reviewer and have a blog offering a monthly report on new fiction and non-fiction.